Moscow Fumes, Vows Response, After State Media Telegram Channels Blocked In EU
Zakharova condemns West’s “systematic cleansing of all undesirable sources of information.”
Moscow is fuming after at the start of this week several Russian state media outlets were blocked for EU-based users of the messaging app Telegram. Starting Sunday the channels of RIA Novosti, Rossiya 1, Channel One, NTV, Izvestia and Rossiyskaya Gazeta were inaccessible in the European Union.
Kremlin officials slammed the “act of censorship” – with Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova describing “the systematic cleansing of all undesirable sources of information from the information space” as ongoing in the West.
Late last summer Telegram CEO Pavel Durov was indicted in France for allegedly allowing criminal activity on the app. France’s arrest of him at a Paris airport when his private jet arrived was highly unusual, given they went straight after the CEO and founder.